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***
The moment you get pregnant, it&#8217;s as if your family, your friends, and even complete strangers are issued a license to offer unsolicited opinions about your body, your eating habits, your birth plan, and occasionally your entire future.
As I write this, I&#8217;m less than a month away from giving birth to our son — or, as I prefer to call it, serving him with his official eviction notice. I&#8217;ve always been jealous of those women who say they love being pregnant. That is not me.
What I do love, though, is motherhood. It&#8217;s been by far the best chapter of my life. I&#8217;m obsessed with being a mom, and it&#8217;s made me a better person in more ways than I can count. If having children didn&#8217;t require pregnancy, I&#8217;d probably have 20 of them. It&#8217;s the cooking process that&#8217;s a horror show for me.
From the moment I get pregnant, my body seems to launch a full-scale rebellion. I swell up. Think of Violet Beauregarde from &#8220;Willy Wonka.&#8221; That&#8217;s me. I spend nine months counting down the days until I can comfortably tie my own shoes again.
Part of the reason pregnancy is such a sensitive subject for me is that my first experience was emotionally and physically traumatic. Around the 20-week mark, my husband and I were told our daughter was measuring small and might not be getting enough nutrition. Thankfully, she arrived perfectly healthy. She&#8217;s still petite and still not a big eater, which turns out is just who she is.
As difficult as that pregnancy was mentally and physically, it paled in comparison to the fear. For half my pregnancy, I lived with the possibility that something might be wrong with my baby, and there was nothing I could do except wait. Everything hurt, but the uncertainty hurt the most.
By the time it was over, I was convinced I never wanted to do it again. Thankfully, God had other plans. And my daughter can&#8217;t wait to have a built-in best friend.
What I wasn&#8217;t prepared for the second time around was how many people would treat my pregnancy like a public discussion forum. So before you approach a pregnant woman with an observation, a prediction, a warning, or a &#8220;helpful&#8221; piece of advice, allow me to offer a few examples of what not to say.
1. &#8220;Are you going to breastfeed?&#8221;
I have never understood why complete strangers feel entitled to ask pregnant women about their future feeding plans. Imagine walking up to someone and asking detailed questions about their breasts. Weird, right? Yet somehow, the moment a woman gets pregnant, all social norms go out the window and everyone suddenly becomes a lactation consultant.
The truth is that breastfeeding can be an incredibly personal and emotional topic. Some women breastfeed for years. Some can&#8217;t breastfeed despite desperately wanting to. Some choose not to. Some supplement with formula. And some spend weeks crying in the middle of the night feeling like a failure because breastfeeding isn&#8217;t going the way they hoped.
Before my daughter was born, I thought breastfeeding would come naturally. It didn&#8217;t. Because she was so small, she was losing weight, and I wasn&#8217;t producing enough milk to keep up with her needs. I ended up supplementing with formula during a nationwide formula shortage. (Living through that is a story for another day.)
Like so many parts of motherhood, feeding your baby comes with a learning curve, frustration, guilt, and plenty of moments when you wonder if you&#8217;re doing enough. A pregnant woman doesn&#8217;t owe anyone an explanation for how she plans to feed her baby. If she wants to talk about it, she will. If not, trust me, there are plenty of other topics to discuss.
2. &#8220;Sleep while you can.&#8221; 
 
This one always makes me laugh because by the third trimester, sleep is already a distant memory. I haven&#8217;t slept well in months. Between the constant trips to the bathroom, the inability to get comfortable, the back pain, and a tiny human using my ribs as a jungle gym at 2 a.m., I can assure you that I&#8217;m not exactly banking extra sleep hours before the baby arrives.
Whenever someone tells me to &#8220;sleep while you can,&#8221; I&#8217;m always tempted to ask if they have any suggestions on how, exactly, I&#8217;m supposed to accomplish that.
The truth is that newborn exhaustion is real. I know I&#8217;ll probably feel like I&#8217;ve been hit with a serious case of jet lag for a while. But at least when the baby arrives, I&#8217;ll finally get to meet the tiny roommate who&#8217;s been keeping me awake all night. And somehow that makes it feel worth it.
3. &#8220;You&#8217;ve gained a lot of weight!&#8221;
I&#8217;m on the shorter side and usually weigh around 100 pounds. So when I go from 100 pounds to nearly 200 pounds during pregnancy, my appearance changes. Dramatically.
One day, while I was eight months pregnant, I was on FaceTime with a close family member. We weren&#8217;t discussing pregnancy, weight gain, or anything remotely related to my appearance when she suddenly stopped and pointed out the obvious.
&#8220;You don&#8217;t even look like yourself,&#8221; she said. &#8220;Your face is huge — you have a double chin — you&#8217;re usually a stick. I just don&#8217;t get it.&#8221;
Then came the follow-up.
&#8220;Maybe you&#8217;re just holding the camera too close to your face.&#8221;
Sadly, I wasn&#8217;t. If anything, the camera was farther away than normal because I was trying to fit my entire face into the frame.
As if that wasn&#8217;t enough, a few months earlier my husband committed his own pregnancy-related offense.
Before I tell this story, I need to defend him: My husband is one of the kindest people I know. He&#8217;s also the type of person who occasionally sticks his foot in his mouth.
During this pregnancy, I started a new remote job. A few months in, my boss wanted the new employees to get together for a team bonding trip. For most people, this probably sounds fun. For me, it was my worst nightmare.
I love clothes. I love dressing up. And suddenly I had nothing professional that fit me. I was already feeling uncomfortable in my own skin, and now I was about to meet all of my coworkers for the first time while six months pregnant and feeling approximately the size of a small parade float.
For days, it was all I talked about. I worried about what I was going to wear. I worried about how I looked. I worried about making a first impression while feeling physically miserable. At one point, I realized the only clothes I could fit into were my husband&#8217;s. I told him I was going to have to raid his closet because baby boy had made me too big to fit into any of my own clothes.
Trying to be helpful, he reminded me that I wasn&#8217;t just gaining weight because I was growing a human.
&#8220;I think the strawberry milkshakes from McDonald&#8217;s are playing a role too,&#8221; he said.
Now, to be fair, I had developed a slight addiction to McDonald&#8217;s strawberry milkshakes. So he wasn&#8217;t wrong.
But there are moments in life when being correct is not the goal. This was one of those moments.
To his credit, my husband spends the other 99% of his time making me feel beautiful, especially when I feel my worst. He simply learned the hard way that when a pregnant woman is venting about her appearance, she is not looking for a detailed breakdown of her eating habits.
And that&#8217;s really the point of both stories. If a pregnant woman has gained weight, trust me, she knows.
4.&#8221;Just wait&#8230;&#8221; 
If you&#8217;ve ever been pregnant, you know exactly what I&#8217;m talking about. No matter what you&#8217;re experiencing, someone always has a &#8220;just wait&#8221; ready to go.
Tired?
&#8220;Just wait until the baby gets here.&#8221;
Feeling overwhelmed?
&#8220;Just wait until they&#8217;re crawling.&#8221;
Then it&#8217;s walking.
Then it&#8217;s potty training.
Then it&#8217;s school.
Then it&#8217;s teenagers.
Then, somehow, it&#8217;s grandchildren.
It&#8217;s as if pregnancy and motherhood are one giant game of people trying to convince you that your current stage isn&#8217;t actually difficult because something harder is always coming.
The problem is that these comments almost always come from a good place. Most people aren&#8217;t trying to be negative. They&#8217;re trying to relate. They&#8217;re trying to share their own experiences.
But when you&#8217;re pregnant, especially for the first time, it can feel like nobody is allowing you to enjoy the stage you&#8217;re in.
Not every moment of pregnancy is magical. Trust me, I&#8217;ve spent enough time swollen, uncomfortable, and unable to tie my shoes to know that. But not every moment has to be overshadowed by what&#8217;s coming next, either.
Instead of saying &#8220;just wait,&#8221; try saying, &#8220;You&#8217;re going to love being a mom.&#8221;
After all the swelling, anxiety, weight gain, sleepless nights, the comments on this list, that&#8217;s the part that matters most. Honestly, I can&#8217;t wait. Every minute with my daughter has somehow been better than the last. The lack of sleep, the endless messes, the tantrums, the worries — it&#8217;s all been worth every second.
5. &#8220;Because she&#8217;s fat.&#8221; 
 
This one is by far my favorite because it came from my innocent daughter, who was three years old at the time and therefore legally exempt from having a filter. As every parent knows, toddlers have a unique gift for saying exactly what they&#8217;re thinking with zero regard for timing, context, or social consequences.
It was the week of Valentine&#8217;s Day, and I was driving around town (probably headed to McDonald&#8217;s for a strawberry milkshake, if we&#8217;re being honest) while happily working my way through the Valentine&#8217;s Day candy my husband had bought me.
My younger sister called, and because the phone was connected to the car, the conversation was on speaker.
&#8220;It sounds like you&#8217;re eating,&#8221; she said.
&#8220;I am,&#8221; I replied. &#8220;I&#8217;m eating the Valentine&#8217;s Day candy Hunter got me.&#8221;
Without missing a beat, a tiny voice chimed in from the backseat.
&#8220;Because she&#8217;s fat!&#8221;
Silence.
Now, in fairness to Rayne, watching her mom transform into a swollen, waddling version of herself over the course of several months was probably a little confusing. Thankfully, my sister jumped in immediately.
&#8220;Rayne! She&#8217;s pregnant! Tell your mom she&#8217;s beautiful.&#8221;
There was a brief pause. Then came the response I&#8217;ll never forget.
&#8220;Mom, you&#8217;re beautiful — and fat.&#8221;
Honestly, I don&#8217;t know whether to laugh or cry every time I think about it.
Of course, it turned into a teachable moment about how we don&#8217;t ever use the word &#8220;fat.&#8221; But it was so innocent. She wasn&#8217;t trying to hurt my feelings. She was simply making an observation in the brutally honest way only a three-year-old can.
And that&#8217;s why it remains one of my favorite pregnancy stories and one of my favorite examples of what not to say to a pregnant woman.
So if someone you know is pregnant, here&#8217;s my advice: Tell her she looks beautiful, ask how she&#8217;s feeling, and then immediately stop talking. It&#8217;s a strategy that&#8217;s worked surprisingly well for my husband ever since he survived the Great McDonald&#8217;s Strawberry Milkshake Incident of 2026.

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Five Things You Should Never Say To A Pregnant Woman

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***
I grew up a &#8220;child on the margins,&#8221; a child of addicts and therefore a child of chaos. I had what I considered to be a normal life: school, dance, parents arguing, checking pulses, and praying the lights turned on. My parents loved me greatly, but their love was limited to what they knew. My parents’ addiction existed long before I did; it was no surprise that it stayed as I grew up. I learned to be the responsible one of the family.
When I was 14, we lost my dad to his addiction, and the last thread of our chaotic lives began to unravel. My mom and I became unprovided for and unprotected. We were helpless and homeless for three months. We begged, borrowed, and stole to get by. We wore every valuable possession we had left and stayed on guard. While we were homeless, my mom found friends more dangerous than the last few, and while she was in jail again, they turned on me and assaulted me. My dad’s death brought new extremes to my life that had only existed in nightmares.
When my mom was released from jail, we had a “new start.” I registered at a different school. But the cycle continued, and my mom went to jail again. This time it was different. The teachers, police officers, and caseworkers actually noticed me. They noticed not only that I was alone, but they also noticed me: my personality, preferences, and emotions. They wanted to know more and help me. As I began to trust them, I shared my trauma and memories with them and then with Harmony House Children’s Advocacy Center. This led to being placed in foster care.
In April 2020, I was placed with my foster family. With a simple hour-long drive and a duffel bag in the doorway, I was introduced to lively, fun, healthy, and joyful chaos, the type of chaos caused by happy children rather than unhappy adults. The family had two loving parents, five biological children, and one other foster child. They all stood and stared as they watched “the new kid,” eyes full of curiosity and compassion.
After much food, play, “trauma dumping,” and hibernation, just 12 days later, at age 15, I found out I was pregnant.
At this new place, I was separated from everything and everyone I knew, good and bad. I wondered how attached to this new life I could become. Even with every uncertainty, I became a mom in an instant. I thought, “It can’t be harder than raising my own mother.”
Though I was fearful, I knew that as a mother to my own child, I was responsible for him. Fearing the family’s reaction and judgment, I trembled and waited. I feared being kicked out and abandoned again. My foster mother noticed my anxiety. Instead of judging, putting me down, or kicking me out, she gently explained, “We will keep and love you and your baby if you’d like to stay. We are glad to raise you and your baby.”
Thankful to have such reassurance, I set off with her for my first ultrasound on May 1. That afternoon, my excitement disappeared when we went to my old house to get a few of my things for the baby and found my mother, who had overdosed.
In one year of my life, I became fatherless, homeless, assaulted, a foster child, a mom, and an orphan. Somehow, I dared to hope just one more time that this would be my last “new start.” I&#8217;ve learned you can be bitter or get better. I chose to settle into my new life and learn.
As I watched my foster family interact, I realized they did not live their everyday lives in fear, guilt, and shame. I wanted that life of love for my child and wondered how I could make it my son’s reality too. Later, God showed me the best way to have that life for him was to learn how to live it myself. I learned that my second mom and dad had their own problems and their own pasts, but they chose to live life together and to show love every day. I learned to hope, and my son became my inspiration. Hope became the reason I could choose life for not only my son, but for myself too.
Every mom has a story before motherhood with mixed feelings surrounding it. What matters is what we choose to do despite our baggage. My life today is beyond what I ever hoped for in my wonders or my worries. Daily, it is full of joyful chaos and full of love, structure, and consistency. Part of my daily life is YoungLives, a teen mom support group. We still meet several times a month, where I am reminded I am far from alone. I’ve been with YoungLives for five years now, and as I have grown into adulthood and welcomed a couple more children, I have become an example of what a little hope and resources can do.
Today, I am a friend and aid to other teenage mothers. As we sit around the supper table or play games, I get to listen to their joys and troubles, whether mundane or extreme. And because of the life I have lived, I can even relate to them. As they share, they may not realize that until I say something to the effect of, “I remember those times.” Many girls have responded with anger or disgust, but once I explain a bit about my story, they quickly realize that I was and still am one of them, just further down the line.
It is one of my greatest joys that when people look at me today, they do not see the pain and hurt of my past. Instead, they can see the love of a mother and friend. Today it is my choice and honor to get to share what a little hope can do.
***
 Angel Rassi is a Christian wife and stay-at-home mother of two children — with another on the way. She works with teen mothers and their families through Ohio Valley YoungLives.

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***
Call her daddy? More like call her mommy. 
“Call Her Daddy” podcast host Alex Cooper’s <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DYcNSWLjsjV/?hl=en">pregnancy announcement</a> sent the internet into a frenzy — not because a woman is having a baby, but because this woman is. The host who built an empire telling young women to stay unattached, sleep around, and never apologize for it is now married, expecting, and apparently just fine with all of it. Critics cried hypocrisy. But are they right?
Now, I&#8217;m not here to defend Alex Cooper&#8217;s rhetoric, content, or influence over young women&#8217;s decision-making in any way, but I can&#8217;t help but notice that the criticism of her supposed anti-marriage, anti-motherhood stance misses the point.
Most criticisms surrounding Cooper’s announcement were that she “secretly” dated, decided to get married, and now is becoming a mother after she had told young women to be forever single. So much for a secret! Cooper announced her &#8220;intimate beachside wedding in the Riviera Maya&#8221; in <a href="https://www.vogue.com/slideshow/alex-cooper-and-matthew-kaplan-wedding">Vogue</a>. And her pregnancy announcement was foreshadowed by, ironically, a full episode titled, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TamkxdBiNyY">“I’m Not Ready For A Baby…”</a> in which she openly discussed trying to get pregnant with her husband Matt Kaplan, including going off birth control and questioning whether she was fertile, ultimately concluding the timing wasn&#8217;t right. Hardly the words of someone opposed to motherhood.
Cooper’s podcast has unashamedly encouraged young women to hook up with whomever they want, whenever they want, for however long they want. She has sold a young woman’s twenties as a time to explore any and all desires, party on, and not give an “eff” about what anyone else says. It’s the Samantha Jones philosophy for sex. But unlike the &#8220;Sex in the City&#8221; character, Cooper has chosen monogamy and motherhood — fortunately, as will many other girls who grew up listening to her bad advice.
Millennial women grew up in one of the most &#8220;sex-positive&#8221; moments in history, choosing to not align with traditional timelines for marriage or child-bearing and to &#8220;enjoy their youth&#8221; instead. But this doesn’t mean they’re not getting married or having kids, just like Cooper. Rather, women are delaying these milestones into their late-20s and 30s.
According to a senior fellow at the Institute for Family Studies, Cooper’s pregnancy comes at a, dare I say, “normal” time in her life. Lyman Stone, who shared a study <a href="https://x.com/lymanstoneky/status/2056453849054167132?s=20">on X</a>, says this: 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
For a non-Hispanic white woman married to a non-Hispanic white man with no children prior to marriage where both have a college degree, 48% of first births were between ages 29 and 33.
Since virginity at ages 29-33 is a statistical minority, and even single-partneredness is, we…
— Lyman Stone 石來民 🦬🦬🦬 (@lymanstoneky) <a href="https://twitter.com/lymanstoneky/status/2056453849054167132?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 18, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
If Cooper’s timeline isn’t exactly late, and even with her pro hook-up culture rhetoric, she still has the natural desire to get married and have kids, then some may argue, what’s the harm in all of this?
The reality is that women (and certainly men) are using their twenties to party and sleep around — and for some, it might even result in finding the right person. It did for Cooper. But the larger dilemma is that in the name of bodily autonomy, many women find themselves entering a life of adult adolescence, which delays these milestones for a larger portion of the population than in the past. Many women eventually find themselves asking: Where did I go wrong? When in reality, the choices they made may not have been shaping them into the kind of women men envision as &#8220;wifey material,” and leave them feeling like a shell of themselves.
There are many nuances to this theory, but what time cannot change is this: the standards are different for men and women. Society has encouraged young men to “sow their wild oats” and choose to settle down once they reach a place of financial stability that is enough to support a family. Women, on the other hand, even after decades of so-called “progress” and feminism, will still be called slanderous names for having multiple sexual partners.
In season 2 of &#8220;Sex and the City,&#8221; Carrie wrestles this truth: “If you’re a 30-something woman living in Manhattan and you refuse to settle and you’re sexually active, it’s inevitable that you’ll rack up a certain number of partners. But how many men is too many men? Are we simply romantically challenged — or are we sluts?”
The danger in Alex Cooper&#8217;s so-called advice and laissez-faire sexual philosophy is that although she may have ended up in the right place, the question remains: is it working out for the women who have listened to her? It may have for some, as many women desire marriage and motherhood even while playing the field. But for others, they&#8217;re left confused and wondering why, at 30 or older, they still can&#8217;t seem to find a husband.
The truth is, women still want these things, and they are very good things. The best, actually. And rather than empowering themselves by sleeping around like men — without emotion, detached, and &#8220;just for fun&#8221; — many women are turning up feeling left behind, unprepared, and diminished by choices they once thought were liberating. This is the real danger.
Alex Cooper&#8217;s story has a happy ending. The question worth asking is whether the philosophy she sold along the way leads other women to the same place, or leaves them stranded somewhere in the middle, wondering where the script went wrong. Empowerment that only works for the person selling it isn&#8217;t empowerment at all. Call her what you want. Just don&#8217;t call her a role model.
***
Isabella Redjai is a multimedia marketing and senior producer at the Manhattan Institute.

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***
When well-meaning people tell expectant moms that “motherhood changes you,” they may be more right than they know. A new study by brain scientists in the Netherlands suggests that a mother’s brain undergoes distinct changes after having a second child that seem to help her adapt to caring for her growing family.
A decade ago, a related study found that women’s brains lose gray matter after having a first child, and the changes last for years — something researcher Elseline Hoekzema referred to as “<a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/22/health/pregnancy-brain-changes/index.html">synaptic pruning</a>.” Second-time mothers’ brains appear to be “more strongly altered in networks involved in reacting to sensory cues and in controlling your attention,” researcher Milou Straathof <a href="https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-02-pregnancy-uniquely-female-brain.html">said</a> of the recent study.
The new study, detailed in an <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-69370-8">article</a> published in February, found that the changes were distinct enough that “women could significantly be classified as having undergone a first or a second pregnancy based solely on their brain changes between sessions.” X user Anish Moonka <a href="https://x.com/anishmoonka/status/2049010221847310400">shared</a> a synopsis of the study ahead of Mother’s Day, causing many moms to comment that they were thankful to know their so-called mom brain moments, though frustrating, had an underlying purpose.
“It&#8217;s incredibly important to study how pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting affect the brains of women (and men, too). The majority of adults become parents at some point in their lifespan, but there are still major gaps in our understanding of how the transition to parenthood affects our neurobiology, cognition, health, and brain aging,” psychologist and professor Darby Saxbe, author of the forthcoming book &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Dad-Brain-Science-Fatherhood-Shapes/dp/1250387523">Dad Brain: The New Science of Fatherhood and How It Shapes Men&#8217;s Lives</a>,&#8221; told The Daily Wire in a statement. Saxbe is listed as a peer reviewer of the 2026 article.
The 2026 study involved 110 women who underwent MRI brain scans to examine data points such as gray matter volume, resting-state brain activity, and white matter tract organization. The women were divided into three groups: women pregnant with their first child, women pregnant with their second child, and a control group of women who were not pregnant.
Psychologist and licensed behavior analyst Lauren Mahoney, who teaches at the City University of New York, told The Daily Wire that the research tracks with her personal experience as a mother.
“After my first child, the shift felt internal. My attention narrowed in a way that almost felt protective,” Mahoney said. “I remember thinking how strange it was that I could pick up on the smallest cues but at the same time forget something as simple as why I walked into a room.”
“After my second child, the shift was entirely different,” she continued. “I had a very clear moment where I thought, ‘My brain doesn’t get to stay in one place anymore.’”
The concept of matrescence, the process of becoming a mother, is important for women to be aware of, experts told The Daily Wire. Many people describe it as the process of transforming from maiden to mother. 
“Another important piece of the research is that the most significant changes in first-time mothers occur in the default mode network, which is heavily involved in self-referential thinking and understanding other people’s thoughts and emotions,” Mahoney said. “That helps explain why first-time mothers often describe such a profound identity shift. They are not just caring for a child. Their brain is actively reorganizing how they understand themselves in relation to another human being. By the second pregnancy, that system has already adapted. So instead of restructuring identity again, the brain appears to refine and build capacity for managing complexity. That is where the shift toward attention and action systems becomes so important.”
The findings of the study weren’t a total surprise for researchers who have conducted similar studies with animals and had similar findings, said neuroscientist <a href="https://www.jodipawluski.com/">Jodi Pawluski</a>, author of the book &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Mommy-Brain-Discover-amazing-maternal/dp/1772584878">Mommy Brain</a>.&#8221; Pawluski said the new study may point out the obvious (or at least what is obvious to experts) — that a second-time mom experiences changes in neural networks related to attention, sensory, and motor pathways — but it’s still very important research to build on.
“The majority of the research we have on the maternal brain has focused on how becoming a mother for the first time is related to changes in the brain,” Pawluski told The Daily Wire in a statement. “However, the majority of mothers have more than one child, so understanding how the second (or third, or fourth) time impacts a mother&#8217;s brain is incredibly important to ensure we are doing all that we can to support mothers and families.”
The authors of the new study were also interested in how these brain changes correlate with mother-baby bonding and peripartum mood. The article states that for both groups of pregnant women, less pronounced brain changes were linked to depression.
Many people underestimate the amazing nature of the mother-baby connection, Dr. Kristin M. Collier, associate professor of medicine at the University of Michigan, told The Daily Wire, <a href="https://churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles/a-relational-theology-of-biology/">citing research</a> that shows that a mother’s voice can affect her child’s brain structure, can influence her baby’s heart rate, and is likely a key factor in her child’s development of language.
The new study could contain meaningful information for moms going about their everyday lives, Mahoney said. Most importantly, she wants moms to give themselves grace when they feel like they no longer function the way they did before having children.
“The difficulty focusing, the constant mental switching, [and] the feeling of being cognitively stretched are often interpreted as personal shortcomings, when in reality they reflect a brain that has adapted to manage complexity and unpredictability,” she said. “When women understand this, there is often an immediate shift from self-criticism to self-compassion. They begin to work with their brain instead of against it. That might look like structuring tasks differently, allowing for more flexible attention, or recognizing that efficiency now looks like responsiveness rather than sustained focus.”
Either way, moms can be grateful for scientific proof that their &#8220;mom brain&#8221; is actually their superpower.
***
Evie Solheim is a freelance journalist, book reviewer, and author of the newsletter <a href="https://eviefordham.substack.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Girl’s Guide</a>. Find her on X <a href="https://x.com/EvieSolheim" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@eviesolheim</a>.

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This article is part of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/introducing-upstream-a-lifestyle-and-culture-section-of-the-daily-wire" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Upstream,</a> The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.
***
America dedicates an entire day each May to celebrating mothers — with record-breaking spending anticipated to exceed $<a id="m_1960138851229861155OWA91f8c48e-7edd-9f07-7d7a-907a7940b805" href="https://nrf.com/blog/2026-mothers-day-shopping-plans" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://nrf.com/blog/2026-mothers-day-shopping-plans&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw31ENQv_7pXQfy8drgpRhRI">38 billion</a> in 2026. Yet our culture sends mixed messages about motherhood itself.
Pregnancy is often portrayed as a condition to “treat” rather than a miraculous process to honor. This paradox — celebrating mothers while minimizing the biological and societal value of motherhood — reflects a deeper cultural confusion about the meaning of life, womanhood, and women’s health.
As an OBGYN, I have spent a decade witnessing what clinical reality and physiological evidence consistently affirm as truth: pregnancy is not a pathology but a design of remarkable complexity, resilience, and purpose.
In today’s age of hyper-individualism, women are caught between competing messages: pursue autonomy at all costs or embrace motherhood as fulfillment. Social media and the pursuit of personal branding have deepened the sense of disconnect from generational wisdom. The Nigerian adage “it takes a village to raise a child” speaks to a lost communal truth: Human flourishing is best achieved when each generation appreciates the relationship between those who have gone before us and those who will follow.
The widespread commercialization of Mother’s Day demonstrates that most Americans, regardless of ideology, still instinctively revere motherhood. Yet that same society often dismisses pregnancy, the thing that makes us mothers, as threatening, inconvenient, or limiting. This contradiction undermines the scientific realities of what it means to conceive, nurture, and deliver new life.
Pregnancy is an interplay of medicine and miracle. It mobilizes nearly every physiological system, and modern research continues to uncover profound, health-promoting benefits that accompany this process.
Multiple pregnancies and breastfeeding <a id="m_1960138851229861155OWA8f89a243-356d-065d-46c1-777c5459f60b" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12133652/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12133652/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0jgWRlAx5oFOFT1pElFbWO">reduce</a> lifetime breast cancer risk by nearly 60%, <a id="m_1960138851229861155OWAff44f0df-0ab7-dc7b-d8c6-289d41b7be16" href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6558958/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6558958/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0-SDEYISV_mFBnMhFMToVL">ovarian</a> cancer by 50%, and uterine cancer by 40%.
In a fascinating phenomenon known as <a id="m_1960138851229861155OWA1f7ec6f9-0f0f-142e-be4b-7b0fc435f663" href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0301211500004322" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0301211500004322&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0s6vyQpTabb_Rnjycjq97n">fetal cell migration</a>, fetal stem cells enter the maternal circulation and persist for <a id="m_1960138851229861155OWA3f07e641-2340-2447-bdb8-405f4f2a894d" href="https://www.nature.com/articles/nri.2017.38" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nature.com/articles/nri.2017.38&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1oOD7zOnJYrHwykLAM4yxb">decades</a>. These cells contribute to tissue repair, enhance immune response, and have been associated with the early detection and removal of malignant cells.
Commonly mislabeled “pregnancy brain,” structural <a id="m_1960138851229861155OWAec600369-c244-bd63-b517-006f18672c32" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27991897/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27991897/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw18rQ-BYj7VZA8qXz0M6KtN">brain</a> changes are induced during pregnancy that optimize maternal responsiveness and efficiency, crucial for infant bonding and protection, and emerging <a id="m_1960138851229861155OWA9c5b02a1-a1fc-2c29-2d7c-a696ac465c33" href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4701185/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4701185/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1778348291211000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2dTPUvs_6KxXyy5dLXzRa3">data</a> suggest that women who have more children may experience slower biological aging, possibly due to protective hormonal effects.
These findings align with what physicians have witnessed for generations: Pregnancy is transformative, not degrading.
Clinical practice offers daily reminders that, while pregnancy is transcendent, it is not without risk. Just this year, I’ve come alongside a mother who, after years of heartbreak, recurrent pregnancy loss, and infertility, gave birth unmedicated in a tub to a vigorous 9-pound boy. I’ve also held the hand of a mother whose waters ruptured at 20 weeks, and whose babies lived only brief, beautiful moments. The spectrum of pregnancy’s emotional experience — euphoria, grief, awe — reveals the full breadth of maternal strength.
These paradoxes persist far beyond the delivery as we continually walk our children down the path of independence, all the while willing them to “stay little forever.” Motherhood is a lifelong act of nurture balanced with release. As mothers, it is natural that we feel a connection from before our positive pregnancy tests until we surrender those beautiful babies out into the world to achieve their magnificent destinies.
Progressive narratives increasingly portray the baby as a threat to a woman’s safety or autonomy, limiting female potential. This is not only sociologically harmful but also medically inaccurate. If pregnancy were inherently unsafe or pathological, no rational woman would willingly engage in it, yet billions do, instinctively and joyfully.
The data also tell a different story. Pregnancy fosters physiological integration, strengthens immune systems, and contributes to mental health and longevity. The maternal-fetal relationship represents one of the most symbiotic biological phenomena known to science. To deny this reality is to deny the brilliance of female biology itself.
Pregnancy is not easy, nor is it without risk. But its challenges reflect not imperfection, but the inherent superpower of nurturing, sustaining, and bringing forth life. The maternal body is uniquely tailored to endure and heal through it. Within that truth lies a powerful message for modern women: Your body was designed with purpose and strength.
Motherhood embodies the union of biology, courage, and divine design. Modern science affirms what faith and intuition have long known: Life in the womb is intentional, purposeful, and profoundly interwoven with the health and flourishing of the mother herself. The moment of conception initiates a symphony of physiological and emotional transformation that strengthens women and knits generations together. A truly life-affirming culture defends and dignifies both mother and child, honoring pregnancy not as a condition to be cured but as the miracle through which life and love begin anew.
***
Vivina Napier, MD, FACOG, is an Ohio mother of five and a board-certified OBGYN. 
</div>

Woman with sprouted plant is expecting a baby.

The Surprising Thing Modern Culture Keeps Getting Wrong About Motherhood

Mother

The following is an edited transcript excerpt from <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/mks-ep-1945-sub?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">The Michael Knowles Show</a>.
* * *
A huge proportion of babies born in the United States are now born to foreign nationals who are cheating the immigration system. 
Can we acknowledge this whole “anchor baby” thing is a problem? I should hope so but I’m not totally sure that we can.
The whole concept of birthright citizenship comes from the British. The idea stems from a distinction between jus soli — the right-of-the-soil — and jus sanguinis — the right-of-blood. The notion that you get your citizenship from the blood of your parents versus receiving citizenship because you were born on certain soil.
Well, we get the idea from English common law. And guess what? The English — the Brits — have not had jus soli, right-of-the-soil birthright citizenship, since 1983. So even they recognized there’s a problem.
Can we too recognize that there’s a problem here?
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/mks-ep-1945-sub?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-1054531 aligncenter" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/MK-watch-now-1-1024x171.jpg" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/MK-watch-now-1-1024x171.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/MK-watch-now-1-300x50.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/MK-watch-now-1-768x128.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/MK-watch-now-1-1536x256.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/MK-watch-now-1.jpg 1800w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
Western Lensman gives some very good background on this topic on X, posting a clip about pregnant mothers from Turkey giving birth in the United States. Here&#8217;s the clip:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
2020. Turkish anchor baby ring found operating in Long Island, NY — mothers got taxpayer funded healthcare.
This is insane:
&#8220;Prosecutors say more than 100 pregnant women from Turkey came here to give birth, so their children were instantly granted U.S. citizenship.&#8221;… <a href="https://t.co/mjxyihjeO2">https://t.co/mjxyihjeO2</a> <a href="https://t.co/QcWl50rEXd">pic.twitter.com/QcWl50rEXd</a>
— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) <a href="https://twitter.com/WesternLensman/status/2039716413225550306?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 2, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Source: WesternLensman/X.com
There are “anchor baby” operations — what amount to birth tourism schemes — that have been operating in this country for years. Prosecutors described a case on Long Island where more than 100 pregnant women from Turkey came to the U.S. to give birth so their children would automatically receive U.S. citizenship.
<blockquote>The defendants fraudulently facilitated the births in the United States of approximately 119 Turkish children. And those children now hold birthright U.S. citizenship.</blockquote>
Officials alleged the scheme was openly advertised abroad — essentially marketing the idea: if you want your child to be born in the United States and become an American citizen, this is how you do it.
This is a business. This is an industry.
You see versions of this in other countries too — there were similar cases involving Chinese birth tourism operations in the past.
So, again I ask, can we acknowledge that this is a problem?
Yes.
Where does the problem derive from? It derives from what is now an outmoded conception from English common law — so much so that the English themselves moved away from it — and from interpretations of the 14th Amendment that have been expanded far beyond what some argue was originally intended.
So what’s the solution?
The solution, very obviously, would be to place limits on how birthright citizenship is applied. You don’t necessarily have to eliminate it entirely — you could define it more narrowly. Some argue that even within the text of the 14th Amendment there are grounds for interpretation about who qualifies, since the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” has historically been debated.
That’s the argument.
And the broader point is this: if a country cannot define who is and is not a citizen, then it raises serious questions about sovereignty and governance.
That’s why this debate keeps coming up.

New parents watching babies in hospital nursery

‘Anchor Baby’ Schemes Are Thriving And The System Making It Possible Is Still Untouched

14th Amendment

babies

birthright citizenship

citizenship

Great Britain

Michael Knowles

Turkey

The Daily Wire&#8217;s Isabel Brown fired back after the hosts of ABC&#8217;s &#8220;The View&#8221; went into full meltdown mode on Monday over her passionate support for younger women embracing more traditional families.
&#8220;I’d like to thank the women of @TheView for showing their truest, darkest colors today: they’re literally shrieking like demons at the thought of encouraging young women to have children. PS &#8211; &#8216;stupidest&#8217; isn&#8217;t a real word,&#8221; Brown posted.
&#8220;They want you to hate happy, healthy, fulfilled young people with kids. Even more disturbingly, they want you to hate babies so much that you never want them in the first place. Their response to my encouragement for Gen Z women to get married and have kids? &#8216;You&#8217;re telling people to have as many babies as they want to? Again I&#8217;m going to send you back into the past,'&#8221; Brown continued. &#8220;In other words, *wanting* a baby literally is not a choice as a so-called &#8217;empowered&#8217; woman in 2026.&#8221;
Brown doubled down, saying that she believed the family was the &#8220;strongest threat to evil&#8221; in the world, and adding, &#8220;Again, I reiterate: HAVE THE COURAGE to get married and have a beautiful family. Your life will be better because of it.&#8221;
After promising to further address the topic — and the comments from &#8220;The View&#8221; — on her next Daily Wire show, Brown shared the full segment from the ABC midday talk show: &#8220;If you just can&#8217;t help yourself in the meantime &amp; want to grab some popcorn — here&#8217;s the whole segment of 5 grown women screeching about how I am the &#8220;stupidest&#8221; person on the Internet, who should divorce my husband, and probably never should have become a mom in the first place. Misery sure loves projection, doesn&#8217;t it?&#8221;
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
And if you just can&#8217;t help yourself in the meantime &amp; want to grab some popcorn &#8211; here&#8217;s the whole segment of 5 grown women screeching about how I am the &#8220;stupidest&#8221; person on the Internet, who should divorce my husband, and probably never should have become a mom in the first… <a href="https://t.co/ijm2z8MxfV">pic.twitter.com/ijm2z8MxfV</a>
— Isabel Brown (@theisabelb) <a href="https://twitter.com/theisabelb/status/2038691529795965026?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 30, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Whoopi Goldberg opened the segment with a clip of Brown, speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), encouraging young women to get married and have children — and she and her cohosts immediately claimed that Brown was promoting backward thinking.
Goldberg began by claiming that women of color had been criticized in the past for having too many children, saying they were the reason that government assistance programs were getting cut.
Cohost Sara Haines argued that by promoting traditional families, Brown was reducing women to only the value of their reproductive organs: &#8220;The whole women&#8217;s movement was not about bucking the trend of staying at home or loving tradition. It was giving women a choice to do what they wanted. And that&#8217;s what this is too. Marriage, children. It&#8217;s a choice.&#8221;
&#8220;The fact we keep putting this on women, that their only worth in society, politics, policy is if they produce a baby or have a husband is the stupidest, most old-fashioned thing!&#8221; Haines continued. &#8220;We have come too far! The world has over 8 billion people! We no longer need to force people to procreate and pump out babies! We have arrived here! Women now and girls now have a choice!&#8221;
Ana Navarro also weighed in, ignoring the fact that Brown had been clear about women getting married prior to starting families and complaining that no one was expecting men to step up and be responsible for all the babies.
&#8220;If you&#8217;re not paying my bills, you don&#8217;t get to tell me what I do with my uterus,&#8221; she declared.
Cohost Sunny Hostin went a different direction entirely, claiming that Brown&#8217;s position was untenable primarily because of President Donald Trump. Blaming him for the fact that child care was too expensive for most working families, Hostin argued that women should think twice before following her advice.
Goldberg followed right behind, arguing that red states were enacting laws that were not encouraging women to do anything other than &#8220;flee&#8221; from them: &#8220;You&#8217;re telling people to have as many babies as they want to? Again I&#8217;m going to send you back into the past.&#8221;

Isabel Brown

Daily Wire Host Fires Back After ‘The View’ Melts Down Over Her Support For Young Families

Daily Wire Host Fires Back After 'The View' Melts Down Over Her Support For Young Families

Media

Politics

The Daily Wire

The View

Welcome to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/introducing-upstream-a-lifestyle-and-culture-section-of-the-daily-wire" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Upstream,</a> The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.
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Pro-abortion advocates speak often about women’s health and “rights.” At the darkest moment of my life, however, they offered me nothing more than a pill and the lie that my impending abortion would be “just like having a period.” Years later, after grieving my lost child and overcoming the trauma of abortion, I am appalled that activists market abortion drugs as “<a href="https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/abortion/the-abortion-pill/how-safe-is-the-abortion-pill" target="_blank" rel="noopener">safe</a>,” and “<a href="https://www.reproductiveaccess.org/2022/03/safe-effective-empowering-self-managed-abortion/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">empowering</a>.” I am also shocked that these drugs are available via mail order, which leaves women to suffer alone or to experience forced abortions at the hands of abusers.
My experience with abortion drugs opened my eyes to the fact that they endanger women’s health, safety, and happiness. Truly empowering women means ensuring that they are fully informed before they decide about something that could negatively change their lives.
In 2018, I discovered I was unexpectedly pregnant. I already had a son and was not yet married to my then-boyfriend, Lane. Lane thought abortion was our only option. Fearing I could lose the first good relationship I’d been in, I decided to pursue abortion to appease him. Lane and I ventured to Planned Parenthood, where we rejected the offer to see our baby on the ultrasound screen.
The nurse seemed to realize my discomfort and suggested that I take a few weeks to think through the decision since I was still so early in my pregnancy. Secretly hoping Lane would change his mind, I agreed to take the time. Yet after two weeks passed, Lane was still sure abortion was our only choice.
Leading up to the abortion, I was terrified. I shook uncontrollably and had an awful feeling about what it entailed. When we arrived at Planned Parenthood, staff told me that I could take the chemical abortion pill, that it would just be like a heavy period, and that everything would be fine. They did not warn me about any long-term physical or emotional effects.
I should have listened to my gut — especially after hearing the grief of the couple in the hospital room next to Lane and me, where another young woman sobbed while her partner told her it was the only choice they had. My heart breaks for her to this day.
When the doctor arrived to check in on Lane and me, I asked him again if he was sure this was what we wanted to do. Rather than seeing that I was feeling pressured into this major decision, the doctor expressed annoyance while telling me to take it or leave it.
I took it.
Afterward, I went to the pharmacy to pick up the next set of pills. I’ll never forget the pharmacist’s face — his unmistakably sad expression and our mutual knowledge that he could not interfere with what I was about to do.
When I got home, I became drowsy and kept waking up to intense and extremely painful cramps. Because I’d had a baby before, I realized with shock that my body was not just having a “normal period,” but that the pills I’d naively swallowed were preparing my body for labor. After intense pain and bleeding, I ran to the bathroom. I felt something pass. There, in the toilet, was my baby.
I was in a state of shock. Nobody had prepared me for any of this. I didn’t know what to do, so I simply cleaned myself up and got back in bed. The next week, shock turned to extreme grief. The next month, I felt guilt. Then followed years of mingled guilt, grief, and suffering. At times, I felt like I had genuinely lost my mind — an emotional reaction I have since learned was due to my abortion. In all that time, Planned Parenthood never once reached out to check on me and Lane.
Lane and I slowly picked up the pieces of our relationship and lives and tried to heal. We both struggled to forgive ourselves. Through God’s grace and forgiveness, however, we were more vulnerable with each other and began rediscovering our faith. Through prayer and communication, Lane and I slowly learned that what we thought would be forever was just a temporary suffering that opened our eyes to the horrors of abortion drugs.
Today, we hope to turn the tragedy of our story into hope for others who might be struggling. To those who may find themselves in our shoes, I encourage you to trust your gut and to make sure you are fully informed before agreeing to a permanent decision that could leave you with painful scars while robbing you of your unborn child. I urge any woman to look at the ultrasound before making a permanent decision. We wish with our whole hearts that we would have.
I hope you also know that you don’t have to grieve or undergo this suffering alone. Across the country, a network of nearly 3,000 pregnancy resource centers strives daily to meet the material, financial, emotional, and even professional or educational needs of women and children in need. These organizations provide <a id="m_-1227438176112384738m_1183941747262835175OWA096ace12-89ba-23df-8f05-764a436af953" href="https://lozierinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/A-Legacy-of-Life-Love-2025-Rising-to-the-Occasion-with-Unwavering-Care.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://lozierinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/A-Legacy-of-Life-Love-2025-Rising-to-the-Occasion-with-Unwavering-Care.pdf&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771510971851000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0dQPvCJRrwHiKq9PG7Nkjk">hundreds of millions of dollars&#8217;</a> worth of lifesaving support that offers women alternatives to abortions they do not need and <a id="m_-1227438176112384738m_1183941747262835175OWAc08e866a-5733-03dd-3f32-95cc4af1a55a" href="https://lozierinstitute.org/hidden-epidemic-nearly-70-of-abortions-are-coerced-unwanted-or-inconsistent-with-womens-preferences/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://lozierinstitute.org/hidden-epidemic-nearly-70-of-abortions-are-coerced-unwanted-or-inconsistent-with-womens-preferences/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771510971851000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3SA5iv4OiArGttgO1_7gdq">often do not want</a>.
Not only that, but they exist to offer hope and healing to women who have experienced abortion, like me. And unlike those pushing abortion drugs without informed consent, these wonderful people will do everything they can to make you feel known, supported, and loved.
***
McKenzie Kaupa-Thiesse is a wife, mother, and fighter for the unborn.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Ultrasound of a pregnant woman and pills medication

They Said Abortion Was The Only Option — Here’s What They Left Out

Abortion

Abortion Drug

This article is part of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/introducing-upstream-a-lifestyle-and-culture-section-of-the-daily-wire" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Upstream,</a> The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.
***
Perhaps the most common feature of the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2026/01/14/politics/maha-birth-control-politics-of-the-pill">flurry</a> <a href="https://www.ama-assn.org/public-health/population-health/what-doctors-wish-patients-knew-about-birth-control">of</a> <a href="https://www.npr.org/2025/10/27/nx-s1-5535839/population-shift-birth-rate-misinformation">articles</a> <a href="https://www.kff.org/health-information-trust/misleading-narratives-and-social-media-shape-contraception-perceptions/">about</a> <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953623004380">young</a> <a href="https://msmagazine.com/2025/12/17/young-women-teen-girls-gen-z-birth-control-beliefs-democrat-republican-tiktok-misinformation-contraception/">women</a> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/sep/17/birth-control-why-are-influencers-turning-away-from-the-pill-and-towards-natural-contraceptive-methods">rejecting</a> <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/10/09/health/ob-gyn-reveals-troubling-trend-shes-seeing-with-gen-z-women/">hormonal</a> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/02/style/birth-control-skepticism-wellness-tiktok.html">birth</a> <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2024/03/21/stopping-birth-control-misinformation/">control</a> is the claim that their concerns are fueled by “misinformation” or based on “unfounded theories.” I’m a younger millennial. I’ve never used hormonal birth control, and I don’t plan to. But what these writers and doctors fail to grasp is how fed up women are of being told their pain is normal and prescribed a pill at 13, only to be told they have “unexplained infertility” and need IVF at 30.
It doesn’t take a medical degree to hypothesize that women’s healthcare has gone terribly wrong. It is almost entirely structured around either suppressing or bypassing the female reproductive system altogether. When journalists and doctors claim women like me are misinformed, they reject an opportunity to help make women healthier. 
For 60 years now, the standard of care for women in the United States has been a protocol that seeks not to understand and work with the female body, but to inhibit and short-circuit it. It’s no surprise that the women who watched their mothers and grandmothers unquestioningly swallow the pill and continue to suffer are now demanding a better way.
The increased rejection of hormonal birth control also comes amid a tectonic shift in medical treatment for minors.  Several major medical associations recently issued <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/pediatricians-group-says-research-doesnt-support-gender-affirming-treatments">statements</a> against pediatric gender transition in the wake of the Fox Varin lawsuit, which held medical providers responsible for performing a double mastectomy on a minor. Sex-rejection treatments and surgeries involve medicating children with puberty blockers and hormone therapies, among other things. And yet many adolescent girls, some as young as 11, are prescribed hormone therapy in the form of the hormonal birth control pill or an IUD, despite their long-term effects being largely unknown.
Of sexually active 15 to 19-year-olds, almost half are prescribed some form of hormonal birth control. This, despite the fact that there are no large randomized controlled trials on the effects of synthetic hormones during girls’ pubescent years. Some research on this cohort has shown <a href="https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/120/5/1135/71113/Contraception-and-Adolescents?utm">reductions</a> in <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0010782408002801?utm_source">bone mass</a> and <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40097087/">density</a>, which is itself concerning. But little exists on long-term effects to adolescent brain or cardiovascular health, both of which actively require sex hormones for development. Animal studies <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40188588/">show</a> that exposure to hormonal contraceptives during adolescence has persistent effects on the female brain and behavior, though it’s unclear how this translates to humans.
Your response to women rejecting hormonal birth control will almost certainly depend upon your answer to one question: What is medicine? The same ideology that undergirds the transgender movement forms the foundation of women’s health, too: “My body, my choice.” But making your body in your own self-image is not medicine. It’s choice theory applied to the human body. And the philosophy of choice will always be insufficient because it inherently rejects the bounds of reality.
What if women’s health was actually about making women healthy instead of maximizing choice? The solution to America’s health problem is the same as the solution to transgender ideology: Respect reality, recognize that our bodies bound us and we can’t make ourselves into whatever we choose to be, and accept that women’s bodies are different from men’s. That’s not only okay but also good. Women’s bodies were made to bear children; blaming the patriarchy or <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-pursuit-of-equality-is-ruining-your-marriage">raging about the system</a> will not change that fact. Let medicine be about restoring the body’s natural function, not trying to change it. When we become unfocused on what the practice of medicine is in principle, people get hurt, even when medical professionals have the best intentions.
As a woman who has been on the receiving end of so-called “women’s healthcare,” it seems as though there is little will to understand the potentially negative effects of hormonal birth control, or the positive effects of working with rather than against the female body’s natural function. After all, birth control is convenient and perhaps even something of a sacrament to the feminized, sexually evolved West.
“Women have been taking the pill for decades,” I was told by a pushy doctor at an Ivy League research hospital, who wouldn’t let me leave his exam room without a prescription for the minipill for the extreme cramps I was having in my early 20s. When I asked for a hormone panel to help diagnose a potentially underlying health condition, fearful I’d be unable to conceive later in life, he said, perhaps revealing more about himself than intended, that a hormone panel wouldn’t tell him anything.
But not all women’s health practitioners are so unimaginative. Dr. Naomi Whittaker is a board-certified OBGYN and surgeon focused on women&#8217;s restorative reproductive medicine. She’s also the founder of <a href="https://www.rrmacademy.org/">RRM Academy</a>, which employs both conventional medicine and the latest in restorative reproductive techniques. “Working with the female body rather than against it is the cornerstone of what I do,” she said. “I see hormones not as a nuisance to suppress, but as a language the body uses to communicate.” She calls restoring the body’s natural function “the spirit of restorative reproductive medicine.”
Even still, the establishment offers these doctors no help. Medical associations and education do not teach the kind of medicine Dr. Whittaker practices, and they are deeply skeptical of it. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Society for Reproductive Medicine have <a href="https://www.asrm.org/globalassets/_asrm/advocacy-and-policy/advocacy-activities/2025/2025-08-13-joint_letter_opposing_rrm_081425.pdf">issued statements</a> and <a href="https://www.asrm.org/news-and-events/asrm-news/press-releasesbulletins/asrm-hosts-capitol-hill-briefing-for-policymakers--congressional-staff-to-hear-from-providers--patients-about-importance-of-ivf-access-realities-and-limitations-of-restorative-reproductive-medicine/">held congressional briefings</a> against restorative reproductive medicine. After all, it is a competitor to the medical status quo at a time when the government has expressed more interest in women’s health and fertility. It seems as though the medical establishment is vying for a cut of a much-hoped-for government check.
Regardless, women continue rejecting the status quo. And this rejection comes amid an explosion of so-called “fem-tech” companies marketing devices (usually wearables, such as rings or watches) to assist women in either avoiding or achieving pregnancy naturally.
These devices use sensors to track temperature, sleep, and heart rate, among other things, to pinpoint ovulation or even underlying health conditions. Natural Cycles, which uses an AI algorithm adjusted to each individual user, became the first app to be cleared by the Food and Drug Administration as birth control in 2018. And Oura, whose sensor-laden rings have become something of a <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2026/02/09/oura-ring-lobbying-rfk-maha-washington-00770320?nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b7bd0000&amp;nname=playbook&amp;nrid=b076877d-0054-4fa6-8bd9-93aa06bde864">status symbol</a> in Washington, is aiming higher than transforming women’s healthcare: It is purporting to change the face of American healthcare altogether.
Wearables such as the Oura ring are not only designed for tracking menstrual cycles, though they can do that. They are also designed to help wearers know more about their bodies (sleep quality and blood oxygen, activity, or stress levels, for example) and to help alert them to potential illness. Only a few months ago, an older-style wearable — the Fitbit — alerted me that my heart was in arrhythmia and told me to go to the emergency room. At 31, I am not the usual candidate for atrial fibrillation, and the ER doctor assumed the device had been faulty. After performing an EKG, he was amazed to find the watch had been right. Untreated heart arrhythmias are the most common cause of sudden cardiac death in the world.
American medicine has long suffered from being reactive rather than proactive. We treat symptoms and diseases rather than teaching people how to avoid them. After all, symptom and disease management is where all the money is, and healthcare, like all businesses, needs money to survive. But wearables may be a sign that’s changing. After all, Oura’s market valuation of $11 billion dollars is more than four times greater than it was just three years ago. 
As women continue rejecting the pill, those beholden to the medical status quo will probably continue blaming women for falling prey to misinformation. That’s a lazy response. They’d do well to look a little closer: Women may be the early adopters of a new age of American medicine, rejecting pills and their unintended side effects in favor of preventative and restorative approaches, with wearables at the helm. American women seem to be ahead of the curve in heralding a return to true medicine. The only question is: Will the medical establishment get on board?
***
Katelyn Walls Shelton (<a href="https://x.com/AnnaKateShelt">@AnnaKateShelt</a>) is a visiting fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center’s Bioethics, Technology, and Human Flourishing Program and a 2025 Robert Novak Journalism Fellow. Her Substack is <a href="https://katelynshelton.substack.com/">Technically Human</a>.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Birth Control Pills, Female Contraception Estrogen Hormones, Prescription Medicine for PMS

The Pill Revolt — Why Millennial Women Like Me Are Rethinking Hormonal Birth Control

Birth Control

Health

Media Bias

Technology

As if the 2020s couldn’t get more surreal, the United States is no longer only a global leader in economic and military power — but it has now become the go-to international hub for mass-producing babies.
This is not hyperbole. Chinese video-game billionaire <a href="https://www.wsj.com/us-news/chinese-billionaires-surrogacy-pregnancy-7fdfc0c3">Xu Bo</a> has reportedly fathered over 100 children — 12 of whom so far have been born via surrogates in the USA, thus gaining birth-right citizenship. Bo says he wants at least 20 US-born offspring — all boys (superior to girls) to one day take over his business. When a Los Angeles Court denied Bo parentage rights over 4 of these babies in 2023 — none of whom he had actually met yet, as he had been “busy” — it exposed the uncertain terrain of international surrogacy arrangements. Where, and to whom, did these children now belong?
In another disturbing story in the press this week, a surrogate mother in Nevada is now suing a Chinese couple in California, alleging she was deceived about their identities and intentions, learning only after giving birth that she had carried the twenty-sixth child for the same pair in quick succession. Some of the babies had been hospitalized by abuse. According to reports, the FBI is now <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/02/04/us-news/surrogate-sues-chinese-parents-of-26-she-claims-duped-her-tell-me-the-truth-about-the-baby-i-carried/">investigating</a> whether the couple were selling these babies they were producing at scale.
Meanwhile, members of Congress are <a href="https://blakemoore.house.gov/media/press-releases/representatives-blake-moore-john-moolenaar-introduce-legislation-to-prevent-foreign-adversaries-from-abusing-american-surrogacy-industry">scrambling</a> to address federal loopholes that allow foreign nationals to use American surrogacy services while securing birthright citizenship for those children.
The free market is one of the great engines of American prosperity, but it has never meant that anything and everything may be bought and sold. America prohibits the sale of organs, the sale of votes, and the sale of citizenship. Western countries do so not because we oppose free markets, but because we understand that some things are too fundamental to human dignity and national integrity to be reduced to commerce.
Surrogacy crosses that line. Under surrogacy, a child becomes a commodity exchanged for cash. Women become raw materials to be exploited for reproductive gain. Payment structures, abortion clauses, ‘selective reduction’ decisions in the case of twins or triplets — all are negotiated with a “surrogate” mother in advance, and are usually at the discretion of the “commissioning party”. Whatever sales language is used — “intended parents,” “journey,” “compassion” — the structure is unmistakably commercial. And increasingly, it is international. <a href="https://eggdonorandsurrogacy.com/surrogacy-trends-2025/">Projections</a> suggest the global surrogacy market will exceed $129 billion by 2034.
Even in situations outside of the extreme, surrogacy is harmful to children. Every surrogacy deal, no matter how well-intentioned, deliberately inflicts a severance wound on a newborn baby – isolating her from the only mother she has ever known – and places her in the care of the adults who commissioned its trauma. Psychologists warn that this kind of early separation can produce lasting harm — post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, attachment disorders, developmental delays, and behavioral issues in later childhood. What adults call a miracle, the child experiences as loss. We don’t allow puppies or kittens to be separated from their mothers until at least 8 weeks following their birth. The commodification of human newborns is striking in comparison.
A national ban on surrogacy is obviously necessary to protect babies from being commercialized, and women’s bodies from being commodified as wombs-for-rent. But a domestic ban will not be enough to fully prevent this exploitation. It isn’t only Chinese billionaires who look to take advantage of reproductive technologies abroad.
Where American couples have found the cost of surrogacy prohibitive at home, they’ve looked to economically vulnerable women in lower-GDP countries – Mexico, Guatemala, Nigeria, across Southeast Asia – to rent their wombs for less. To end exploitation, America must shut down their own role as a consumer in the global trade too.
National bans have turned into an international cat-and-mouse chase. When India banned surrogacy for foreigners after years of operating as a hub for cheaper “reproductive tourism,” international surrogacy clinics quickly migrated to Nepal and Thailand. When Thailand restricted commercial arrangements following scandals, agencies shifted operations over to Cambodia. After Cambodia shut them down, they popped up in Laos. Bans move in the right direction, but we need a global crackdown, fast, to prevent the overseas baby trade from flourishing from one country to the next.
The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, Reem Alsalem, is in agreement. She called for a complete global abolition of surrogacy in her <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/10/un-expert-calls-recognition-surrogacy-system-violence-exploitation-and-abuse">recent report</a> to the United Nations, highlighting human rights abuses intrinsically interwoven in the use of women’s bodies as gestational vessels. The United States is in a powerful international position to embrace this mandate and take a lead on the world stage.
A national ban on surrogacy is an imperative to prevent exploitation at home, but further work must be done to ensure that wealthy American couples don’t continue this unethical practice by buying babies from overseas. For this administration, that means pursuing international cooperation on the issue; negotiating agreements to prohibit such trade; and promoting a shared commitment to protect human dignity across borders. America should have no part in the global trade of human life — be it as consumers or suppliers of the goods. Babies simply aren’t for sale.
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Lois McLatchie Miller (@LoisMcLatch) is a writer and commentator from Great Britain.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Doctor examining a pregnant woman

How America Became A Hub For Global Surrogacy

Children

China

Surrogacy

A Florida couple has filed a lawsuit against a fertility clinic in Orlando after they realized the baby they&#8217;ve been raising wasn&#8217;t their own. Tiffany Score was allegedly implanted with another woman&#8217;s embryo last year during the in vitro fertilization (IVF) process.
According to <a href="https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/florida-couple-ifv-error-lawsuit-search-daughter-biological-parents-moral-obligation">Fox 35</a> in Orlando, the couple welcomed the baby girl in December, but became concerned after noticing that she appeared to be a different ethnicity than either parent. The couple wants to raise the baby, but their lawyer told The Daily Wire the main priority is finding her biological parents.
&#8220;We love our little girl, and if possible, we would hope to be able to continue to raise her ourselves with confidence that she won’t be taken away from us,&#8221; Steven Mills and Tiffany Score said in a statement. &#8220;At the same time, we are aware that we have a moral obligation to find and notify her biological parents as it is in her best interest that her genetic parents are provided the option to raise her as their own.&#8221;
Mills and Score are suing the Fertility Center of Orlando, as well as a physician, alleging the doctor implanted the wrong embryo, resulting in Score giving birth to a baby who is not genetically hers or her husband&#8217;s.
The mother underwent an embryo transfer in April of 2025 before giving birth in December. The lawsuit alleges the Fertility Center of Orlando implanted the wrong embryo five years after the couple had the mother&#8217;s embryos frozen.
The lawsuit states that the parents have formed an &#8220;intensely strong emotional bond&#8221; with the baby after Score carried and delivered the child, which the couple named Shea.
&#8220;Despite the certain knowledge that Shea is not their genetically matched child, the emotional bond grows stronger every minute of every day that Shea remains in their care,&#8221; the lawsuit said. &#8220;They would willingly keep her in their care; however, for the sake of both Shea and her genetic parents, they recognize that Shea should legally and morally be united with her genetic parents so long as they are fit, able and willing to take her.&#8221;
The couple&#8217;s attorneys are now seeking an emergency injunction, requiring the clinic to preserve records, notify other potentially affected patients, and begin immediate genetic testing for the clinic&#8217;s clients. The lawsuit, obtained by Fox News, states that Mills and Score are asking the clinic to pay for the genetic testing of every child born whose parents had embryos implanted at the clinic during the last five years.
&#8220;Of equal concern to the Plaintiffs is the obvious possibility that someone else was implanted with one or more of their embryos and is pregnant with or has been pregnant with and is presently parenting one or more of their children,&#8221; the lawsuit stated.
The fertility clinic released a statement to Fox 35, claiming officials are looking into this &#8220;error.&#8221;
&#8220;We are actively cooperating with an investigation to support one of our patients in determining the source of an error that resulted in the birth of a child who is not genetically related to them. Multiple entities are involved in this process, and all parties are working diligently to help identify when and where the error may have occurred. Our priority remains transparency and the well-being of the patient and child involved. We will continue to assist in any way that we can, regardless of the outcome of the investigation.&#8221;
Fox 35 spoke to legal experts who said that a child&#8217;s legal parents are typically the genetic mother and father, not the birth mother.

Credit: Searcy Law

Florida Couple Sues Fertility Clinic Over Embryo Mix-Up: ‘Moral Obligation’ To Find ‘Genetic Parents’

Florida

General

U.S.

In 2026, Britain will hit three grim milestones.
First, it will see the number of deaths <a href="https://www.the-independent.com/news/uk/home-news/resolution-foundation-deaths-births-economy-b2894591.html">exceed</a> the number of births for the first time in modern history.
Second, <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01/15/abortions-at-record-high-in-over-35s-because-babies-are-too/">a third</a> of the babies conceived will be aborted.
Third, the number of migrants in its population (10.9 million) will roughly equate to the total number of children aborted (10.7 million) since the procedure became legalized in 1968.
In other words, by ending unborn lives on an industrial scale, the native British population has created a demographic vacuum it now plugs with immigration, and in doing so, has brought itself to the brink of quiet obliteration.
For Brits, the question of abortion is no longer only an ethical one. A nation that does not reproduce itself must import its future. That is not a moral judgment on immigrants, but a mathematical reality. A critical shortage of young people means a critical shortage of recruits for the armed forces, workers in critical industries, and taxpayers to fund defense, healthcare, pensions, and other social services.
If it cannot “grow our own” workforce, it must import one from elsewhere.
Of course, relying on mass immigration to plug a demographic hole of our own making is not a neutral solution. It carries serious national security implications. As has been clear in recent years, weak, strained border controls, over-used and under pressure, give way to criminal gangs, swept in undetected alongside the key workers we need.
Yet while Right-wing politicians fall over themselves to condemn mass migration, hardly anyone in Westminster will risk breathing a word about the abortion crisis that has brought our nation to the point of requiring large-scale human importation. Meanwhile, Members of Parliament <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/world/europe/uk-abortion-law.html">recently voted</a> to exacerbate abortion culture by decriminalizing the procedure up to birth.
Britain is a prime example of why the abortion debate, though emotive and divisive, is worth having. Though some Americans may roll their eyes at the March for Life or the pro-life rhetoric being championed by Republicans, they’d do well to look overseas at a nation which has let abortion destroy them. 
The consequences of abortion, of course, are not only macro-economic. The loss of life alone is devastating, in the case of every child. Broadly, our collective failure to focus on family has left Brits lonelier and more depressed than ever. And as for those women who have undergone an abortion, physical complications, mental health struggles, and silent grief ripple through our healthcare system and society. &#8220;Pro-choice&#8221; psychology professor David Fergusson <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23553240/">published evidence</a> that women who have abortions are significantly more likely to suffer from anxiety, suicidal ideation, and drug and alcohol abuse. Pretending this is a “cost-free” procedure helps no-one.
What makes Britain’s situation especially tragic is that it was avoidable. Marriage &#8211; one of the greatest proximate predictors for adults to have children &#8211; is punished by the UK tax system, discouraging family formation and making it harder to depend on one salary. In the workplace, motherhood is treated as a liability. Poor maternity leave provision and the constant push of government-sponsored “free childcare” pushes women who do have kids back into taxable desk jobs, rather than encouraging them to invest in time at home with their children. All the while, the culture champions the idea that babies are inconvenient competitors to the luxuries of modern life. Abortion is the far cheaper, easier policy option in many ways. But in the long-term, it leads to a nation collapsing from within.
This is why abortion is no longer just a moral issue, but one of national survival. A society cannot abort a third of its future generation and expect to remain intact. Britain is not simply declining, but aborting itself out of existence. America should take note, and continue to fight for a culture supportive of bringing babies into the world. Once a culture decides children are optional, the future becomes optional too.
* * *
Lois McLatchie Miller (@LoisMcLatch) is a writer and commentator from Great Britain.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

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